Fresh FIR filed against arms dealer Abhishek Verma

A fresh FIR in a case of forgery and cheating was lodged against businessman Abhishek Verma.

He allegedly forged a CBI SP’s letter saying an investigation against him is closed due to lack of evidence. He gave the forged letter to his bank to activate his frozen account.

Verma and his wife were on August 22 arrested by the Enforcement Directorate in connection with a money laundering case registered against the couple for allegedly receiving money from a Swiss defence firm to keep it out of the government’s blacklist.

The couple was placed under arrest under the stringent provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) after an ED team recorded their statements.

The arrest of Verma and his Romanian wife Anca Maria Neascu by the agency comes as additional trouble for the duo as they are already embroiled in a host of criminal cases and the CBI has arrested them in two separate cases so far.

Earlier, both the accused had been granted bail on August 8 in a corruption case registered by the CBI for allegedly receiving USD 530,000 from Rheinmetall Air Defence AG (RAD) for using his influence to stall its blacklisting proceedings by Indian government. The ED made this case as the basis for filing its criminal complaint against them.

They were granted bail after the CBI had failed to file chargesheet against them within stipulated 60-day period after their arrest on June 8 in the corruption case.

The CBI, however, had arrested them on the same day in the fresh forgery case, registered on Union Sports Minister Maken’s complaint, in the courtroom itself. They were accused of writing a letter to the Prime Minister in 2009 on Maken’s forged letterhead for easing of business visa norms.